And now for something completely different.
Loneliness is a serious public health problem - the Economist
Studies show loneliness correlates as strongly to negative health outcomes as obesity or smoking. Around a quarter of adults in North America report being lonely. For half of them, the loneliness is chronic.
In a possibly related finding, people in Vancouver and Toronto are the unhappiest in Canada.
Vancouver ranks lowest in Statistics Canada's life satisfaction survey
Saguenay, Trois-Rivières, and St. John's report the most satisfaction with life.
I'd suggest they're related. Vancouver and Toronto are full of people who move away from their families and friends for work, and many end up being socially isolated. Meanwhile, the people who stay behind in places like Saguenay and St. John's maintain strong social networks.
I've long believed that we shouldn't support policies that keep people in economically stagnant parts of the country, and instead encourage migration to the places (pretty much a handful of cities) with high labour demand. I'm starting to reconsider that stance. Most people are more secure and happy with strong familial and social networks, especially at two stages of life - when they're raising young children and when they're elderly. The mobile nuclear family (or childless couple) has strong economic arguments in its favour. But we're starting to see the social cost of this model. Lack of childcare for children. Stressed families. Loneliness and depression among seniors. The health impacts of social isolation.
I think we're also starting to see a sea change around this. Half of my parents' friends picked up stakes in retirement to move closer to their grandchildren. The high cost of housing is driving millennials out of major cities. And to tie it into hockey, we just saw a top star turn down more term and money to be close to family, and one of the most successful executives in the NHL leave a top Stanley Cup contending team he built rather than move his family away from their social network.